I sang this idea when I was around twenty-two, twenty-three. It had not been a happy time.

My brother was plucking away on his guitar in what one might call a “sitting room” and had come up with a very simple melody. I could hear the echoes in it, if that makes sense.

I “whispered” this in the painted man’s ear many years later, and he didn’t understand this, not at all, but I think perhaps he is seeing the truth of it now. Perhaps. As a singer, not so much, he has been to too many places to see the truth of things. He says I can say this again, not because he wishes it, but because he simply didn’t know what I meant. He didn’t think I was the one who told him. He thought it was a dream.

There is no need for belief. This is just reality.

‘Driving down a dusty gravel road

Has no end

And no beginning

Look at a sky that’s blue and cold

Wonder where I’ve been lately…

There’s nothing to be seen

For miles

In the early hours of this morning

All I can remember now is your smile

Wonder where I’ve been lately.’

— Kate Tew. (this was quite some time before I was married, in the scheme of things, so that was the name I used)

It was a song about, not about dreaming, it was a song about loss. I sat in that room with my brother, and his friends, who were my friends, and these friends now can see this as clearly as I can. You see that long, red-pebbled road, the sound of nothing, the plume of dust rising behind from the tyres on the gravel, the flat plains to the sides of the road where everything is low and scrubby, and this pale, pale blue sky that goes on forever. It is during this time, and at this point, I thought I was lost and alone, for that is how it felt. It was a desolation, a loss, and a reminder.

The reminder is; life goes on after these times of grief. Life goes on. You get back up, you dust yourself off, and just keep going. As I said, I was twenty-two, twenty-three at the time. Something had ended in my life, and I was not at the point of understanding it was a good thing. I needed to go through the stages of grief and loss to move on. I am not referring to anything other than a relationship that failed. This is why you need to get out of those sandboxes and see why other people are here.

I tried to make that person understand but it was not the right time for him. He has separated himself for a reason, and it is not my place to verify his identity, which is why it has been changed. This is his reminder of the dream I whispered to his open soul. He grieved later that I did not explain the words.

Is it too simple for you now/not now — this is definitively the truth and not a “piss-take”.

He doesn’t need to be saved. Sometimes I think you people are very silly. This is his choice, not yours, his life, not yours. It will all be shown quite well in the end. I do not judge. I simply listen.